Reviews

Truly a wonderful lawyer, has my mom's best interests at heart. I would highly recommend Christine James if you are searching for an estate/ probate lawyer.

Exc customer service and very prompt

This is the best place to take your family

Worked on a family trust. Replaced an old will. Excellent timely response and quick results. A complete package was presented. A safe environment for signing. I am totally satisfied!

My father, sister and I needed to have a trust and advanced health care directives drafted to fit the specific needs of our family. Christine promptly fit us in for a free consultation, and was extremely professional, patient, and willing to answer any questions we had. We decided to retain her, and after everything was done, we left feeling like we received the best possible solutions and legal representation for our family. Christine is very responsive to emails and phone calls, which was very helpful for whenever we had questions. She was also very polite and friendly. When explaining our options, she made sure to explain the consequences, benefits, and disadvantages of each option, and then guided us towards the best solution. She never made us feel pressured, and was also very generous. Her rates are very reasonable. I would strongly recommend Christine to anybody I know that is looking for affordable, compassionate and professional legal services for their family. Thank you, Christine!

My experience with Edward Batista was very negative. I was one of three trustees and the lawyer for the problem trustee, who is known to be a pugnacious attorney, floated the idea of a private fiduciary. I expressed interest in this but Edward Batista, despite knowing what kind of people the other trustee and lawyer were, dismissed the option outright saying “I would only go that route if we were in a quagmire.” It turned out to be a case of self-fulfilling prophecy because Edward Batista led me into a quagmire that took 16 months and tens of thousands of dollars to resolve (ultimately with another attorney representing me). The kicker was that two months later before the hearing, Edward Batista approached me about a private fiduciary as if he had come up with it de novo. Not only that but Edward Batista failed to notice two of the beneficiaries (the other lawyer knew the trust better than Edward Batista, even though it was written by Edward Batista), which allowed the problem trustee to continue squatting at the real property for 45 more days and wasted a hearing. Moreover, Edward Batista is sloppy in his record keeping, he lacks attention to detail, and his work is of poor quality. (Every document he produced for me had mistakes and typos.) Here is an example of a very serious error he made on one of my grandmother's important legal document, where I have anonymized the names: "If conservatorship of the principal's person or estate, or both, is deemed necessary, the principal hereby nominates , as conservator of the principal's person or estate. If is unable or unwilling to serve, I nominate Person A Person B as my conservator." Where I have replaced the actual names with Person A and Person B. So here we have a paragraph in a finalized, binding legal document where there is a blank for the person named as conservator of the principal's person or estate and two names run together as successors. That paragraph was never invoked but even so that is a completely unacceptable error and Edward Batista's work is replete with such errors. And there were times I would correct Edward Batista and he would ignore me and still get things wrong. In summary, I believe Edward Batista advised me in his own interest, not in my interest, nor in the interest of the trust and he displayed gross incompetence while I retained him as an attorney. For these reasons I must caution others against hiring him for any matter.

My first impression of Mr Batista was very positive. I went home and enthusiastically reported on finding such a serious and knowledgeable lawyer. I gave him 750.00 to start a limited partnership for my acreage with my two sons. Because of personal family events I had to cancel his services. Mr Batista readily sent me a refund for funds unused, 360.00.

I hired Ed about 8 years ago for a very difficult easement case involving a former friend of mine. The case dragged on for years and was a great emotional and financial drain. Ed did a great job on my case, winning me a judgment as a defendant, along with court costs and punitive damages awarded to me even though I was a defendant in the case. He also won a subsequent appeal in the same case. Ed won so decisively that the appeals court ruling was largely copied word for word from his own arguments. Ed is a fantastic lawyer, and I am certain that hiring him allowed me to navigate a very difficult phase of my life with the best possible outcome. I stand behind him as a man of great integrity and recommend him highly.

Christine James set up our family trust. She spent time going over and explaining how a trust works and the different ways we can set it up. This was very helpful to us to actually understand the purpose and benefits of creating our family trust. She is available and responds quickly when emailed. I couldn't be happier with Christine and the quality work and advice she provided us in this process. I highly recommend her!

I hired Edward Batista to help me in my property case. He has been very fair, honest, trustworthy, and hard working. He has gone above and beyond all expectations to win my case. I would highly recommend him.

Mr. Batista handled an extremely difficult probate issue for me. He picked up the case after I had already fired three attorneys. He handled the situation brilliantly. He has a knack for sifting through the irrelevant issues and addressing what is necessary. As a result of his skill, I had a very positive outcome with my case. I was not an easy client. Mr. Batista handled my personality with grace and helped me see that he had my best interest at heart. Mr. Batista IS the attorney that you want on your side........

Christine is amazing! She is caring, knowledgeable and goes above and beyond for her clients. I would recommend her highly!